'You are,' answered Malto drily. 'It is a creature upon which neither your trident nor the strange weapons of your young friends would make more impression than upon yonder rocks! Now you will be able, if we ever come before King Ivanta, to confirm one part of what I wish him to know. King Agrando has a name as a collector of all kinds of curiosities and monstrosities. King Ivanta has himself helped him to make his collection the most comprehensive that has ever been seen'——
'Yes, yes, I know all that,' Alondra put in impatiently.
'Ay, but what you do not know is this—that Agrando's object in gathering these out-of-the-way things about him is not altogether a mere harmless love of the curious. He is a monster of cruelty'——
'A perfect fiend!' Malandris interjected.
'His craze—for such it is—is a sort of madness,' Malto continued. 'It is to set men to fight for their lives with the most terrible creatures he can find to pit against them. That is the amusement he and that demon Kazzaro delight in! That is why they have constructed all these secret places, which none know of save themselves and their myrmidons. Little does the noble-minded Ivanta dream of the proceedings of these two, or of the way in which he has himself contributed to them. If he but knew'——
'Eh, what? How dare—I mean, how can King Ivanta have contributed to such horrible cruelties as you are hinting at?' demanded Alondra hotly.
'I don't wonder that you are moved to indignation, young sir. But I am not blaming King Ivanta. He has been deceived. For instance, he, it is said, paid a visit to another planet, and brought back with him many strange and horrible monsters never seen or heard of on our globe. Is it not so?'
'Well?'
'Many of them were the young of fearful creatures. But, young or old, he presented Agrando with specimens for his collection.'
'Very likely. What then? I see no harm in that.'